What do distributors of wellness products and, say, industrial fasteners have in common? More than you think.
While the inventory and customer bases differ, the lessons learned in their respective trenches are universal. Matthew James, president and CEO of Purity Life Health Products LP in Canada, agrees. He just closed on a major acquisition 13 years in the making and has advice for anyone navigating a complicated integration process. Jason caught up with Matthew to find out how he and his team are managing employee expectations, continuing to foster innovation, and planning for the future.
“It’s distribution,” Matthew says of his niche in the health and wellness space. “It’s a little different than conventional distribution, but at the end of the day, we’re just putting different things in boxes and shipping them to retailers or customers.”
The similarities don’t end there. Economic concerns, such as recent changes to US import/export policies, have affected Purity Life’s bottom line. “We’ve had a long history in our 46 years of doing business with American companies, importing them into Canada. That’s over 30% of what we do,” he explains. “With the tariff back and forth, that had a big impact.”
As stressful as the tariffs have been, Matthew is happy to have an arguably more transformative issue to attend to: an epic merger. “We’re just 12 weeks into this integration process.“The challenge is that we didn’t buy one company. It was one holding company that held three, so, in essence, we bought three companies,” he says. “We’ve taken a very aggressive integration path, and we’re in the early stages of it.”
Acquisitions often involve multiple ERP systems and internal processes. Employees, however, remain the most essential part of a successful integration. “It’s easy to put that on a piece of paper, but it’s something completely different to execute it,” Matthew observes. “The key learning is definitely you’ve gotta work through the people.” To that end, the Purity Life team champions a policy of transparent, reciprocal communication. “We’re learning that we need to really appreciate and validate the change that people are going through and how it’s actually impacting them,” says Matthew.
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QUOTES
“Our business continues to grow steadily and has for the 30-plus years that I’ve been in it. The only difference now is you can’t grow despite yourself. You have to be very deliberate in the growth that you’re trying to generate.”
“For us as distributors, it’s always trying to ride the wave of innovation, knowing that that wave will ultimately come to shore. Sometimes the cycles are shorter, sometimes they’re longer, but you always have to be ready and looking out for that next wave that’s coming, and make sure that you’re on it with your surfboard to be able to ride it.”
“It’s tough for people to appreciate why things need to change.”
“We need to accept feedback as the gift it’s intended to be, although it can be harsh and direct at times or lacking perspective. It is the actual experience for the individual, and so we need to embrace that gift and then respond accordingly.
“If you don’t change anything, nothing will change.”
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Distribution Talk is produced by The Distribution Team, a consulting services firm dedicated to helping wholesale distribution clients remove barriers to profitability, generate wealth, and achieve personal goals.
This episode was edited by The Creative Impostor Studios
Special thanks to our sponsors for this episode: Connected Peers, providing virtual communities for wholesale distributors; and INxSQL Distribution Software, an integrated distribution ERP software designed for the wholesale and distribution industry.
